“But when I say quiet, madame, I mean very, very quiet,” Dr. David insisted gravely; and his eyes smiled gravely down on her, so that she should understand him well.
“And you say,” Virginia went quickly on, “that it will be quite all right for me to be cut into little bits in London? For I was once in a French maison de santé for a few days, and though the nurses were very kind they were dreadfully inefficient, and looked as though they were or might be nuns. It was most depressing....”
The old man chuckled in his beard. Unlike most Frenchmen, he stood on his own and not on France’s dignity.
“But yes, London is easily managed! I have often worked with Ian Black—but you know him, probably? Who in London does not know Ian Black?”
“Yes, I know him,” Ivor said, and Dr. David smiled across at him. Ivor had often met the surgeon, Ian Black, at Rodney West’s house....
“You must come to see me once a week for a while,” the specialist told Virginia, “to let me know how you are. Thus we will cure you.”
“I will come twice a week,” Virginia cried gaily, liking the old gentleman more every moment.
“Well, then, once as a patient and once as a friend,” Dr. David smiled gallantly. “But remember, Lady Tarlyon,” he added gravely, “you must keep very quiet. I warn you that it will be much, much more comfortable for you....”
As Virginia passed out he detained Ivor for a moment. He looked thoughtfully at Ivor.
“If you are a great friend of Lady Tarlyon’s,” said le docteur David, “you will persuade her to keep quiet for the next few months. You will help her to keep quiet, perhaps? These things are very difficult, I know....” And Ivor silently agreed that these things were very difficult indeed.